Assign participant notes so each logged-in participant only sees their own notes

I’m having trouble with
In the CMS I have three tables; Participants, Participant Notes, and Announcements.

Working in
Wix Studio Editor, CMS

Site link

What I’m trying to do
I need staff to be able to assign notes to individual participants, and for each participant to see only the notes assigned to them—nothing else.

What I’ve tried so far
I’ve been working on this far longer than I should have. I’m convinced I’m missing a basic piece of the puzzle, because nothing I’ve tried has worked—and this feels like something that should be straightforward to implement.

Specifically, I’ve tried:

Filtering datasets using the logged-in member ID

Querying the Notes collection directly with currentMember and getMember()

Using reference fields between Participants and Notes

Applying dataset filters on page load and after login

Testing both custom member pages and dynamic pages

Verifying collection permissions and member roles

Confirming that the participant–member relationship is valid and returns the correct IDs

Depending on the approach, the result is either that all participants see all notes, or no notes display at all once filtering is applied.

Extra context
This is built in Wix Studio using a Members Area (custom member page, not a dynamic page). Notes are stored in a separate collection and displayed in a repeater connected to a dataset. Staff members need full visibility and editing access, while participants should have read-only access to their own assigned notes.

Menu navigation, login, and page access are all working correctly. I can confirm that the logged-in member ID is correct and that participants are properly linked—but I haven’t found a pattern that reliably restricts visibility to only the assigned notes.

I would be grateful for any help.

Thank you,
Eric

Filtering dataset, querying collection, and using reference fields - all unnecessary if permissions are set right

You said you verified collection permissions, may I request that you describe what they are?
The way I understand it, you need create permission set to site members, and read/edit permissions set to content creator/owner, with deletion allowed by either content creator or admin, your choice.
Is that in fact the way you have set up your collection?